Harry's POV

There was something about the way Sperling's hair captivated me no matter how messy it was. It always seemed to stick up in just the right places, and, when paired with the light purple circles and the little crinkles around her eyes, and the friendliest smile I've ever seen, made me feel as if I'd known her longer than I had known Bria.

The problem was that I didn't, but I was determined to change that.

We were still laying naked in bed, recovering from our fun a few minutes ago. Sperling called her sister back and apologized only to have Hyacinth burst into laughter, tell Alexa, then have her laugh at Sperling too. It was good they could share a laugh with each other, otherwise I would have been the frowned-upon "boyfriend".

"Can I ask you something?" I whispered in her ear. She shifted and turned to face me, her tired eyes slightly hooded but giving me full attention.

"Anything except my credit card number," she teased.

"Right," I began. I figured that honesty was the best policy, even though I rarely followed that policy myself, "so I've been meaning to ask you about your mum. If you don't want to talk about it—"

"No, it's fine," she replied, propping herself up on her elbow. "My mom's name was Felicity. She met my dad at the zoo; she was protesting against captive animals and my dad went up to her and told her she was crazy. Somehow they still ended up together. I think he fell for the humanitarian in her; my mom was always doing things for the greater good, you know?"

"Kinda like you?"

"No. She was so much more than I could ever be. She was a journalist—uncovering the truth about the world's secrets, making the world better with her articles—but she lost her life because of it."

I stayed quiet. It didn't seem to phase her as badly as I thought it would have, but she still avoided my eyes nonetheless.

"I was twelve when she left for Sierra Leone. She was doing an article about another rise of conflict diamonds and she found out that the leaders of the rebel army went around to villages and massacred everyone except the kids, who would be recruited into the rebel army and drugged up and forced to kill other villagers. It was a vicious cycle that she wanted to stop. She was escorting a group of children to a refugee camp when she came across the rebel army. I'll spare you the details, but they sent us—my dad, my sister and me—a video of what they did to her before they killed her."

"I'm so sorry—" I started, but she cut me off by shaking her head.

"Don't be. It was sad—and it's still sad, don't get me wrong, it was absolutely horrible—but my mom died trying to do the right thing."

"She must've been great," I said. It was hard not to feel pity for her, but she seemed to have grown out of her sadness and used it as a source for inspiration instead.

"She was. Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Sure. Anything at all."

"Tell me about yourself. Your file only says so much," she smiled. I held her hand under the covers, playing with her knuckles as I sighed and thought back to my past, selecting the more important highlights over others.

"I never eat breakfast"—she gasped and looked absolutely shocked—"and I hate drinking orange juice with pulp. I'm also disgustingly smart. I'm a fucking nerd. Finished high school when I was twelve, had my Master's degree by the time I was seventeen, stayed at home and did nothing with my life after that. Well, other than hack websites so I could get clothes and other things without paying for them."

"I should've known," she rolled her eyes. "What happened next?"

"I met Bria."

"What's up with you and her anyway?"

"She was my partner. Recruited me when I was eighteen. I don't know...I guess I liked her expensive taste and her criminal ways. It was fun, I suppose."

"You sure there wasn't something else between you two?" she grinned and poked my chest with her finger.

"We shagged a couple times, but what's a professional relationship without sex, right? Nah, someone proposed to her."

"Proposed? Who?"

"Close friend, I guess. I wouldn't know what happened; she ran away, took all of our money, left the ring on the bed and wrote a note that said 'Vancouver, BC, Canada. Convention Center. 3PM'. I woke up at four in the morning to an empty bed, so I went to go find her. They arrested me for speeding down the highway on my way to Washington; they'd never been happier to have caught someone, honestly."

"That's...wow."

"I wanted to be a famous spy when I was a kid," I admitted, trying to lighten the mood. "Conning people was the closest I got."

"I wanted to be a journalist, but my sister was the one that stole that spotlight," she replied, cuddling in closer to me. "You don't need Bria, Harry. I mean, granted, you were criminals, but nobody deserves that."

"What?"

"To be lied to. We'll get her, I'm sure of it."

A lump formed in my throat. Fucking hell.

"Hey, let's say—theoretically, of course—that...I don't know...a con artist asked a gorgeous and absolutely charming police officer out on a date. What would be his chances of getting a yes?" I asked, diverting the focus from Bria to her. Sperling blushed as I kissed her forehead, smoothing her hair out and brushing her cheek with my thumb.

"It depends on the theoretical con man, of course. And the theoretical police officer."

"Why don't I go with Harry Styles and the lovely Clarine Sperling, respectively?"

"Well, theoretically speaking, Harry Styles isn't nearly as attractive as Thomas Davis—"

"Thomas Davis? God, no, I was talking about American con artists so you can't pull Australian con men into this—"

"Why not?" she raised her eyebrow and smirked, "Isn't this theoretical? He's got a nice body, a killer accent and he's so tall—"

I kissed her to get her to stop talking, pushing the covers off and climbing on top of her. I pinned her wrists above her and broke away just long enough for a deeper blush to creep onto her cheeks.

"You watch that pretty little mouth of yours, sweetheart. Thomas Davis won't fuck you like I can, I promise."

"Yes."

"Yes he can?" I questioned. My stomach churned in the best of ways; my chest ached for her all the time.

"No, I mean yes. Theoretically speaking, Clarine would definitely let Harry take her out on a date. Out of desperation, of course," she grinned. I tried hard to stifle my laughter; she was so hot, and the way her voice practically dripped with desire turned me on so much. I felt my cock twitch at the idea of bending her over my knee and—

"Do you want me to show you what you'd be missing out on if you dated Thomas Davis?" I asked in a playfully threatening tone. Her hands ran up and down my chest, sending sparks from her fingertips to me.

"Nah, I just want you to make me forget who Thomas Davis is."

Jesus fucking Christ, she was dirty.

"As you wish, sweetheart."

***

It was Saturday morning. 'Wouldn't It Be Nice?' by The Beach Boys was stuck in my head (both the question and the song).

Sperling was sitting up at the foot of the bed—knees up to her chest, covers pooling around her hips, bare backed and giving me the naughtiest view of her bum she could deliver—eating a bowl of cereal (honey puffs, naturally) and watching a report about Paris Fashion Week.

"Morning," I croaked. My throat was dry but I couldn't complain—I wasn't the one screaming last night. Her head snapped back and she smiled the best she could with her cheeks filled with her breakfast. She shuffled back to the headboard and swallowed her food before opening her mouth again.

"Doesn't that just look...amazing?" she inquired, pointing at the television screen. Models walked the runway in designer pieces and I imagined Sperling as one of them. She wasn't very tall, but she certainly had the body for it. "These are clips from last year."

"You like fashion then?"

"Oh God, yeah. I love it. My sister's going to the Paris Fashion Week actually. Second row for her journalism thing. I'm so jealous."

"Can you get tickets for that?" I asked casually. It occurred to me that I'd forever be on her good side if she got to watch the Paris Fashion Show.

"No. People get invited, and tickets probably sold out months ago. I can watch it online."

I tried to prop myself up but faltered, my muscles aching from our second 'adventure' the night before. It hadn't sunk in how rough we were; I winced, suddenly feeling everything all at once—the deep purple bruises etched into the skin of my chest, raised red lines scratched into my back, little crescents, created by her nails, imprinted into my biceps. I looked to Sperling, who had her share of marks too—scarlet palm prints on her ass, little oval bruises on her hips, made by my fingers grasping her as I plowed into her and hickeys littered all over her body, mainly congregating around the flesh of her inner thighs, like a canvas for submission and dominance. She noticed my difficulty and helped me up.

"God, you're a wreck. I thought you were into that kinda stuff?"

"I am, I am. It was mind blowing, honestly. You're like a rookie on a baseball team making a home run during your first game."

"I'm no rookie, Styles," she whispered, leaving me with a million questions about what she meant as she left for the bathroom.

We got dressed and made plans to meet up with Sperling's family ("So you're all sexed up, are you? Don't you scamper off to a bathroom with him while we're out!" Hyacinth teased Sperling, to which she rolled her eyes and hung up the phone) at a tea shop close to their hotel at noon, which left us about two hours just to travel around together. Being with her took me away from what I knew how to do—to fraud and to con and to lie—and dragged me towards what I had to relearn—to care and to protect and to appreciate. England was rainy today, as it was every other day, but it didn't stop us from running around London like we were lovers in high school; before the end of our free time, I had more than a hundred photos of us saved on my phone (likewise with her own) and purchased for her a small keychain from a gift store in town (a token of my appreciation, I told her).

Sperling's family was at the tea shop nearly half an hour before us (Hyacinth made some pretty crude remarks that left Alexa groaning into her scone and covering Mabel's ears as she bounced her daughter on her knee), and they decided they had something very special to tell us.

"So Clarine," Hyacinth started with a smirk, her gaze flickering to her sister, then to their dad, then back at her, "that thing I wanted to talk to you about last night before I interrupted your—"

"Don't," Sperling warned through gritted teeth. Hyacinth rolled her eyes and gave me a thumbs up from across the table, which had my neck feeling very toasty all in a sudden.

"Anyway, I'm sure you're aware that I've got tickets for—"

"Paris Fashion Week, we know. Everyone knows—"

"Yeah, and I was thinking maybe you could have the tickets."

Silence. Everybody at the table turned to stare at the two of them.

"I...I—"

"What? You love that kind of stuff. You were practically drooling on the magazine on the airplane. Just take notes about what you saw and I'll write the article. I've got two tickets so you and Trevor could go."

Sperling stammered, unable to find the words to convey what she felt.

"She'd love to go. Wouldn't you, sweetheart?" I started. Her jaw was open and all she did was stare at her sister. "Why the change of mind, Hyacinth?"

"She's always loved fashion. I can't take that away from her," she replied earnestly, without so much as a trace of ridicule in her voice. She was being serious. "Besides, the rest of us aren't into overpriced clothes and cameras."

It was only up until then did Sperling find the voice to thank her sister (what I believed to be a billion times; she wouldn't shut up, but I didn't mind listening to her voice) before I took them around the city to sight-see. When her family was busy taking pictures of the London Eye (Mabel pleaded to ride in one of the double-deckers, which her grandfather allowed after a few minutes of begging), she pulled me aside and squealed with excitement (I assumed it hadn't hit her until then) before leaping onto me and holding me tight. She was going on about what we could wear ("I was looking through your bag and you could wear that leopard print shirt of yours with that black coat, and I have this neat jacket...") and how I could do my hair. It was all very prismatic.

A dozen rants about fashion and a few nights spent laying in naked bed with her and (if not having sex) talking about anything and everything later, after taking the Channel Tunnel to France, I found myself playing dress up with Sperling in our hotel room hours before the show was due to start.

"Sperling, we're not famous or anything. We don't have a right to be overdressed," I groaned as she made me lift my arms to haul the shirt she had chosen onto my body.

"One can never be overdressed or over-educated. Oscar Wilde said that," she remarked nonchalantly, not paying any attention to the fact she hadn't eaten breakfast or lunch yet (which surprised me—usually she would've had a bowl of honey puffs and a three course meal by now, respectively). "And besides, you're going to look great. I love this shirt on you."

"I stole it online. Hacked the website. I can get you—"

She cut me off with a scoff and a shake of her head, putting a black jacket over my shoulders. I had to admit that Sperling was just as good a stylist as she was a cop (that is, if she wasn't preoccupied with impressing her supervisor and teammates).

"You're letting me wear my jeans?" I asked.

"Why wouldn't I?"

"They're ripped."

"All the more reason to wear them," she smiled, stepping back and looking at me the way an architect would to their building. "You look nice!"

"What are you going to wear?"

"Something causal," she said, retreating to the bed to gather her clothes. She lay them out for me—a leather jacket, grey t-shirt, black jeans and a pair of black boots—then stripped down. I found it almost comforting that she was okay with changing in front of me; I hadn't noticed it before, but the subtle movements of her arms and legs pulling through the sleeves of her shirts and pants, the materials hanging off her shoulders and hugging her legs, made for quite a show that could only be appreciated in this light. I never observed such subtleties in Bria; I paid attention to her face and her body but not the way they moved, and certainly not the way I felt when she moved.

"You ready?" her voice called from the door; I dazed out and was staring at the window where she had previously stood. I turned and cleared my throat.

"Ready."

***

I didn't understand how watching people walk up and down in expensive clothes was gratifying in any way. Sperling thought it was the best thing in the world (in fact, the only way it could've gotten better for her was if they gave out cereal to eat while people watched the show) and made a point of whispering all of her opinions to me. I nodded and paid more attention to her than the fashion itself but neither of us minded.

"What's with all the patterns? Isn't fashion supposed to be easy on the eyes?" I asked, squinting my eyes at the sight of an ugly orange and green sweater. "Looks like a carrot."

"This is the lesser known stuff. Wait until we get to PHX—wait, wait, no, they're coming out right now! This is when the good stuff comes in."

"PHX? Sounds like a dish detergent."

"Always one with opinions, aren't you?"

"Was that in my file too?"

Sperling snickered and kissed me on the cheek. I felt myself redden at the contact, leaning over to kiss her back before something—or someone, rather—struck me like a rod of lightning in a field of power lines galore.

Soft, blonde hair, brown at the roots; blue eyes lined with black kohl, setting a harsh contrast between the colour and the whites of her eyes; a devil's stare that, with a wink of her eye straight at me, I could recognize right away.

Bria. Bria. Bria.

It was only for a fraction of a second, but Bria was the type that made only deliberate movements. She trained herself that way.

"Did you see that?" I let the words slip past my lips in a hurry, keeping my focus trained on the woman walking past us with the cream-coloured dress. "Did you see her? The model?"

She had reached the end of the catwalk and turned around to walk back.

"What? No, I was focused on—"

Closer, closer—

"It's—"

And there she was, in plain sight and more beautiful than I had remembered her. But it was, surely and indefinitely, her. She looked again, this time her gaze hovering over me for just a bit longer before heading back behind the curtain.

PHX...Phoenix. The dresses. The fashion show.

"Sperling, I think—"

"It's Evans," she concluded, no longer paying attention to the show. She pursed her lips and pulled her cell phone out.

"What're you doing?" I demanded, snatching the phone away from her. She had already changed her phone wallpaper to a picture of the two of us that her sister had taken outside the tea shop. My heart raced in my chest; there was far too much going on all at once for me to focus. I didn't want to find Bria—I had a plan to just lie my way out of it—but here she was, having found me, a needle in a haystack, out of all odds.

"I was going to call Interpol, but—"

"Don't. Let me take care of it."

"You're not doing this alone—"

"She'll kill you," I whispered harshly. "You heard the others in Vegas."

"Who's to say she won't kill you? I'm not letting you—"

"Well I'm not letting you, so stop being so difficult," I snapped, but instantly recoiling at the harshness of my words. "I didn't mean—I meant that I just...I know what I'm doing. She won't hurt me. I'll pursue her and you look around. I heard some people talking about dresses at the airport—you may want to check those out."

"I—fine. But we're meeting up at the hotel room and I'm not going to sleep until you come back. Am I clear?"

"Yes. Yes, absolutely."

"I care about you," she said softly, here eyes conveying a message of true worry.

"I care about you too."

With one last look the both of us got up and excused ourselves, finding our way to the entrance backstage past the crowd of people watching the show. We peered around before blending into the group of models that scurried to find their place behind an array of curtains. She and I let them pass us so we were concealed by the white sheets hanging from the ceiling.

"Got a gun?" I asked. She nodded and took a deep breath in.

"Good luck," she breathed.

"Don't need it."

"Try not to be an ass when you come face to face with these people, Harry," she scoffed, splitting from me and taking a turn into the dressing room. I progressed steadily down the hall, inching along, wiping my sweaty palms on my jeans, and making cautions decisions on where to turn next. 

My plan was to get out. There was no way that Bria would be in the dressing room after seeing me, so all I had to do was escape this labyrinth before she could find me. I knew she would assume I'd be looking for her, and I couldn't just tell Sperling to leave the show otherwise she'd catch on to the lies I told her.

God fucking damn it.

I could hear chatter in the distance; navigating the halls without a map instantly kicked in my shitty sense of direction and before long I could've sworn I saw the same painting at least three times. I was certain I was heading in circles.

"Fucking hell, which way's the way out?" I cursed under my breath before I felt a hand grab onto my wrist and tug me into an unmarked door to my left. Everything was dark; I felt my body hit the ground, the hand still tugging at my wrist, and then I slid across the ground until the door shut with a clang. The hand released my arm, letting it drop to the floor.

And then a very familiar voice came from the blackness—one that captured me, like a lion with a cut of meat, and marked me as prey instead of predator instantly.

"I like what you've done with your hair, Harry."

***

#hella

yo man i wasn't even aware that harry and suki sat beside each other at the burberry prorsum fashion show until i searched it up and someone told me that they were there together woo

(note: if ur hoping for more smut, i'm afraid it'll be a scarce occurrence from now on!)

idk i don't really have an A/N whoops

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